After a week's stay and receiving clearance that the English Channel was free of U-boats, the American medical personnel left "Blighty" (England) for France on June 9, 1917. Calm weather prevailed as the squad crossed the English Channel and arrived in Le Havre, France.

German prisoners, he noted, gazed at the Americans upon their arrival in France.  Also, "rainloads of wounded arrive at the ship and be carried aboard, also a gang of German soldiers being sent over (to England) as hostages."

Apparently, Norris explained, the German POWs who were working in fields were unaware that the Americans had declared war on Germany. In this photo, French children watch arriving American troops marching through countryside.

As Norris explained, the arrival of American troops brought renewed hope to the Allies, though the British medical personnel were anxious that American arrivals at the base hospital would displace them to the front lines. "The British staff…are not overly pleased by our advent.  They dread, when they depart in the near future, being ordered to Mesopotamia or Gallipoli, the latter being made doubly hellish by mosquitoes, every bite of which means malaria."